


What Was Left

by abrassaxe



Category: Jupiter Ascending (2015)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Jupiter Ascending Fic Challenge, Mr Night's sad flat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-02
Updated: 2015-11-02
Packaged: 2018-04-29 13:00:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5128562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abrassaxe/pseuds/abrassaxe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mr. Night comes home after the disaster at the Jupiter Refinery. The magnitude of the situation starts to sink in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Was Left

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Jupiter Ascending Fic Challenge. Prompt: "going home."

This was not how Chicanery Night had hoped to get some time off from the refinery. Any moment he hoped to be awakened with a _ping_ and a demand for his presence, his intel. There was nothing but silence on all sides, and the painful wakefulness that promised this was not merely another horrific dream. The Jupiter Refinery was gone. There were hopeful whispers, still, that Balem might have survived, but Chicanery knew better. The planet had taken the refinery, and Balem Abrasax too. He had seen enough death to know a man who’s bound for it. Abrasax Industries was at the mercy of Jupiter Jones and her new title, and perhaps the meddling of its Second Primary, the only one to come away unscathed. The calamity, for all its wreck and ruin, had not yet reached as far as Night’s flat, however. His home, such as it was, remained tucked away on one of Jupiter’s lesser moons. Safe and sound. It was a little spitball, not more than three kilometres in diameter, and well out of the reach of the chaos on the planet’s face. A gift from the First Primary of the House of Abrasax himself; likely about as valuable to him as the dirt beneath his fingernails. (As if such a one ever got dirt under his fingernails). Still, Night had grown fond enough of it. It was _his_ little spitball, and it came with a spectacular view. Of course, without the refinery, there would be no more regular maintenance, or supply drops. He’d have to move. But not today.  
  
The front hall was pitch black, and for a moment he feared the lights not might even turn on, the energy that might have powered them diverted to the shielding, climate control, grav-field… All amenities essential to dwelling on what was little more than a pebble hurtling through space. He’d been asked on more than one occasion if it bothered him to live one major malfunction away from a cold death in the Void.  
  
“Not a bit,” he murmured to himself. “Lights, please.” The dim lights hummed as if in protest, but mercifully, came on. There’d be time for a little rest before he packed up his (mercifully few) belongings and set off… Somewhere. The disaster hadn’t left him quite with nothing. Just… Less. He stood numbly in the hall as it began to sink in. He might even have died, there, himself. Just like Lord Balem. Just like… Chicanery shrugged off his coat, and hung it up by the door. It wasn’t much of a house, really. Something to come back to. A tiny kitchen, a tinier bathroom. A place to sleep. There wasn’t even a holoscreen in the living room. He preferred the window, anyway, looking out over his barren little moon, and the grandeur of Jupiter. Today, it seemed only to mock, and he couldn’t look at it for long.  
  
He kicked off his boots halfway into the kitchen, rummaging through the cupboards. Mostly empty. There was no need for much. None of it looked particularly appetizing, and he was quick to give up. There was still a cold bottle of spirits in the freezer. Dark Blue, or something like it, but Night’s stomach roiled at the thought. Not now. Frustrated, or perhaps just resigned, he sought out the relative comfort of his cluttered bedroom. Refuge was impossible in the personal employ of a man like Balem Abrasax, but here there was always the hope of a little rest. Chicanery was not expecting what he happened upon instead.  
  
Draped over the armchair crammed into the corner of the room is a familiar, leagues-too-big leather jacket. The sight of it pierced through the haze at last. Greeghan’s jacket. He’d promised to have it fixed. He walked towards it, almost against his will.  
  
“Just forget it,” he mumbled. Or thought. “Just –” The jacket was impossibly heavy in his hands. It was heavier, falling. The _thud_ seemed to echo inside his head, ricocheting around until it embedded itself some soft spot. It took another moment or two of standing in that awful silence before he began to cry. It was an ugly affair, full of futile, shuddering attempts at pulling himself together. He crumbled, little by little, into the armchair, dragging the jacket off the floor. Why did the Sargorns even _wear_ these blasted things? He curled up underneath it, biting back another sob, impossibly loud, as the hollowness of this place seemed to cave in all around him. Crumbling like the ruptured grav-hull around the Jupiter Refinery. Subsiding into a merciless storm, ignorant of the waste it laid about itself. It was empty.  
  
Some small part of him struggled to reason that there were things to salvage. His network of spies remained mostly intact. There were legion contracts he could pick up. His skills were valuable. Other Entitled Houses needed foremen and intelligencers. This wouldn’t kill him. Why cry? There had never been much of a life working for Balem Abrasax. Why should it hurt to see it ending? Why had he thought, even for a moment, that any good could come of this? He had survived. That was the most he could expect. The most he had expected for a long time. He pulled the jacket tighter around himself. What kind of home had this been, anyway? What hope had there ever been here? Even with… Even with…  
  
“You _idiot,_ ” he choked out. “Why didn’t you evacuate?” There was no answer but the hum of the lights. He scrubbed at his eyes, spent of their tears. Hollowed out, now, like the rest of him.  
  
_You idiot_ , _why didn’t you stay?_


End file.
